This past weekend I had the honor of photographing a performance in Long Beach by the Esencia Flamenca Dance Company. This wasn’t my first encounter with Flamenco and I’m sure it won’t be my last. It is such a beautiful form of dance and always a pleasure to photograph.
For those of you interested in seeing more of my Flamenco portraits click HERE.
Last night Paul Dateh and Ken Belcher held an exclusive and intimate performance in Marina Del Rey. Bonny and I had the honor of photographing the event while Lan and Vu Bui of thebuibrothers.com live-streamed the whole thing online! It was an awesome performance. I’ve seen Paul perform a couple of times now and I’m always completely captivated the entire time. I’m not very good at describing music in words but Paul Dateh’s sound is kind of soulful, funky and jazzy with a whole lot of violin…it’s awesome! The first time I heard him I bought his CD. You should too. Check him out at: PaulDateh.com
You can see the rest of the photos from last night on my Flickr.com page.
A few weeks ago my friends Nicole and Natale called me because they needed some portraits done. But not just any type of portraits. Nicole and Natale are Flamenco dancers and sisters. It was such a unique and enjoyable experience to work with them and I am so excited with the way the photos turned out. They performed last weekend in Santa Monica and I was invited to attend. It was an absolutely beautiful performance, and I was so honored, because their dance instructor Yolanda Arroyo, put the portraits on display in the lobby of the venue for all to see.
Flamenco is such a passionate and dramatic dance with sharp vigourous movements, clapping of hands and stomping of feet, traditionally performed in the company of acoustic guitar music and a spanish vocalist. Its something that is not so much viewed and heard as it is felt. You have to experience it to understand it. It’s beautiful! It was a lot of fun to photograph.
I never once posed them, because I wanted to be sure to capture the movement of their dresses as they danced. Nicole and Natale were so cooperative, which was great because it gave me free reign to use some pretty creative lighting techniques. I really tried hard to express the dramatic mood that I think is at the heart of Flamenco dancing.
